Lou Ureneck, author of BACKCAST, Op-Ed in Boston Globe

Caught hook, line, and sinker
By Lou Ureneck
Boston Globe, April 7, 2008

THE WINTER ice that now locks the streams and brooks across northern New England soon will be breaking up. For a lot of us, this means the Opening Day of the trout-fishing season is just about upon us - the day when the waters are officially open to fishermen to cast their lines.

Winter may not be over, but we know it's exhausted - out of breath - and spring is about to overwhelm it with longer days, warm sunshine, and skunk cabbage poking up along the streamsides. There will be the magical appearance of pussy willows, and the bursting of the swamp maple's winter buds into tiny red flowers.

As I get older, all of this is reassuring - the earth's tilting to the sun, songbirds up from the south or down from the tree tops to pick up worms, and the chance to get back to the swollen streams with a fishing rod. When I was a boy, Opening Day was pure excitement - sorting my hooks and sinkers the night before, rewinding the line on my reel, patching leaky hip boots. It made no difference that the fishing is nearly always poor on Opening Day - the water cold and high and murky from snow melt and runoff, rocking the flooded alders along the banks.

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